The Boondock Saints

Yesterday evening I watched The Boondock Saints with some girlfriends. It was the first time I'd seen the movie. The violence was not usually what I'm eager to watch, but it had some beautiful moments and a properly suspenseful plot. The kind of film that I can understand why it becomes iconic.

I couldn't help being bored, however, by the lame roles of the few female characters in the film. Now, you can come right back and say there are plenty of "women's" films that have cardboard male characters, and you're absolutely right. You can make your blog post about those. Right now I'm blogging about these.

There were a small handful of women throughout the entire film, in scenes lasting around 1 minute 30 seconds. They pretty much had no lines, and when they did talk, the dialogue was always vaguely unnecessary, something extraneous to the plot of the film. Some of them, I presume, were forensic scientists, since they wore white lab coats and had their hair pulled back in important, no-nonsense ponytails. But they never seemed to contribute any actual scientific findings to the crime scenes which they were investigating.

At one point in the film, towards the end, the main detective, who is a riot, is going nuts at the scene of one of the final crimes, a suburban home where massive shootings have taken place both in and outside the home. He can't figure out who these guys are, even though the Boondock Saints are amateurs and doing stuff that he says you "can't do in movies" (cue comic drum and cymbals!).

Meanwhile, the female forensic scientist is taking blood samples from a splattering on one of the new jersey-blue-blood-suburban-home pillars, and making over-exaggerated gestures of exasperation, making me think that she was not classically trained in Method acting. She expresses her distress at not being able to get a good blood sample, and hyped-up detective man comes over to help her out of what should be her job.

He leans over and sniffs the blood, has a conniption about it, draws out the drama of telling everyone what he's discovered, and waves a smear of the blood in the scientist's face, causing her to flail her head away and make a face. Eww! He put something icky near her!

It's ammonia, he announces. The Saints have sprayed it on their blood so that you can't get a decent blood sample. Those Irish scamps! Everyone gasps at the detective's brilliance, and the female scientist makes a figure of wonder and chagrin (she doesn't talk anymore; her dialogue moment is over). Ah, ammonia. Well, now we know.

But why didn't she know? Ammonia is a pretty common smell; it's in your urine, in bad fish, etc. And she's a scientist. I know one of the comic subplots of this film was to present the detective as brilliant and everyone else he works with as a hopeless rube, but even so. Would it have killed the director to let the scientist be the one to say "oh, it's ammonia," and then let detective have his monologue rant? I mean, this is a bloody scientist, but she can't figure out why that blood sample won't take! What a waste of a lab coat.

I bring this up mostly because when I watch films like these, the women in them are so one-dimensional and dumb, and I feel forced to identify with them. Maybe that's just how I watch movies.

Still, let me reiterate that The Boondock Saints is an artistic and powerful film, with a complex look at social justice. I get why it is iconic. But I get annoyed that portrayals like these are generally disregarded because something is iconic. It's like how slavery is kind of okay in Gone with the Wind because awww, look at those pretty dresses! There was a moment in Saints where the Don wants Rocco to tell a joke with the word "n*****", but I feel pretty sure (or I hope?) that the audience is supposed to feel suitably appalled by it.

Well, I've probably offended a great many people with this. If it helps, just pretend I was wearing a white lab coat when I wrote it and disregard the whole thing.

* photo courtesy of http://splashpage.mtv.com/2009/08/12/the-boondock-saints-coming-to-comics/

introducing consumption and debt: a divine comedy

so here begins some postings from one of the academic questions i posed this year in my Cultural Studies program. we had an assignment in our "Class on Class" to go through the steps of researching a topic, but not to actually write the final paper. the idea was to gain mastery of the research process itself, which is indeed extensive and nothing to thumb your nose at.

so now i'm going to write that final paper! or at least, blog it for now. i have a start based on a mini-synopsis we had to write up for our final presentations, and i'm going to use that to launch into a larger quest to explore the potential answers to my question: why is consumption still gendered as feminine, and why do women tend to be blamed for consumption in popular narratives?

for my base narrative, i'm focusing on the film adaptation of Sophie Kinsella's Confessions of a Shopaholic, but my project may delve into other texts and films as my research continues. i think she is a brilliant writer and it is interesting to see how she defines problems of consumption, and how they are rewritten by Hollywood in the 2009 film.

so, here goes!

* photo courtesy of http://www.cablecarcouture.com/retail-therapy-at-blend-fashions/

the 18th century: does it even matter?

so some of my friends have been wondering why this blog ended up being called "the 18th century guide to modern living" when i don't often write about the eighteenth century. well, the answer is that sometimes i do write about it, but that the eighteenth century isn't literally the focus. it's more of the inspiration. it's not all about substituting "s"s with "f"s, or about wearing tight knee breeches.*

in college i truly indulged my lifelong love of jane austen, and around her i built my knowledge of the eighteenth century in literature and history courses. from them i developed concepts of social justice, community activism, education between the sexes and between social and economic classes, and the modern application of those values. i also credit my dear alma mater, gettysburg college, for giving me a profound sense of my ability and responsibility to critically engage with the world.

but the eighteenth century’s sense of interconnectedness has incredible relevance to the modern world. it emphasizes that we are all part of a larger whole; that our self worth is reflected in the worth of the community to which we belong. modern crises in economy, education, environment, and human rights, require actions that are guided by moral character; we have the power and the responsibility to positively apply the insight gained through understanding our connectivity.

exploring these concepts in a historic and modern context is imperative in order to prepare ourselves to think critically about how we will conduct ourselves in our professional and personal interactions. austen was one of those people who cared about such things, and taught me to care.

these are lofty words, but i think you'd better start off high, or your standards will be too low to get anywhere worthwhile. so now i like to write about a dozen different topics–gender, marketing and consumerism, education, really anything that looks interesting. i never forget, however, that in the back of my mind i'm always shaping how i interpret social justice from my mental 18th century guide to modern living.

*although i am a firm endorser of tight knee breeches.

we must sell more shoes!

hmm. here's what i've basically been concluding from my research for my consumer debt v. consumer fantasy project, of which confessions of a shopaholic forms a base text: capitalism doesn't make sense. or, republicans who say we are in debt only (and please note the qualifiers 'who say' and 'only') from overspending, don't make sense. because here's basically how the picture is looking:

1. consumption = bad

2. consumption = gendered (aka feminine, because everyone knows women love shopping!)

3. consumption and especially women's consumption = downfall of economy

4. women, stop buying shoes!

5. CEO of D.S.W. Shoe Warehouse = "we must sell more shoes!"

6. capitalism = whose bright idea was this anyway?

ok i actually don't have such a major problem with capitalism–only with people who pretend it's perfect but blame, in popular media, the undeserving poor wanting houses and frivolous women having credit card debt for every national evil. paul krugman has an interesting blog discussing the problems with this limited assessment of national debt, which my professor just turned me on to, which i'm hoping to incorporate in my presentation somehow...except i only have 15 minutes to talk, so we'll see.

p.s., i realize that if you are outside of my culture studies class, or of the texts i've been reading, this may be a bit nonsensical to you. but i have to vent, so thanks for reading.

look, culture just always applies

oh how tumultuous everything is! not necessarily in a bad way...just in a tumultuous way. which is why i used that adjective. but i've got one presentation down, one to go tomorrow, and one next week. and three papers, but those are all linked to the presentations. and i feel like i have a cold coming.

but i must admit that part of me feels great joy at the thought of being done with this semester…especially being done with certain classes in which the professor says that "culture doesn't apply in this case."

???

how can culture NOT apply? ever?

fashion...it's within all of us

ok, so i think i finally figured out what to focus my fashion/consumerism/gender identity project on. thank heavens. here it is:

the question: how does mainstream fashion and consumerism dictate, influence, or offer an alternative to a middle-class, white, heterosexual identity? the discussion i want to center in on is specifically, how white, middle-class, heterosexual identity is promoted through clothing retail and shopping-centered literature, and how the public responds to this. the popularity of narratives like Confessions of a Shopaholic suggests that the white, middle-class, heterosexual image being portrayed in the narrative, is positively received by a large population, despite the probable evidence that this narrative hardly reflects the reality of its readers. why? if fashion consumption and fashion-narratives that promote a certain dominant image, are widely received even if they are unrealistic, then either the public sees itself as part of that identity whether or not they are, or else the public sees something else within the discourse of mainstream fashion and consumerism that it identifies with.

i like when people say they're not influenced by fashion. guess what: unless you make your own homespun broadcloth out of plant fibers you've picked yourself from a nearby field, with a machine you've handcrafted out of parts of trees that you found in the woods, then you are influenced by fashion.

what is consent?

we are having an interesting discussion in my global women's writing course about the nature of consent, specifically in relation to the now eradicated practice of Chinese footbinding. this has also made me think about consent in other contexts, however–how do we distinguish between what we do out of pure enjoyment versus out of obligation or coercion. what do you think consent is?

here's the blog post i wrote for class:

i like the distinction between the consent of daughters versus that of mothers. in light of Judith Butler's discussion of the agency of children, it has made me think more closely about the significance of China's move to end footbinding as a symbol of Chinese modernity. in a way, both the action of footbinding and the subsequent banning of footbinding are both movements that are made without consent, either way, from girls. part of me feels sure that the new photographic evidence of the bound foot and its medical dangers played a major part in changing public opinion, both in China and in the rest of the world, about the beauty and ethics of footbinding. and yet...was it primarily a humanitarian move of protection of children's rights–or primarily a political, nationalist power play to give China better PR with the western world?

it seems like Dorothy Ko (author of Cinderella's Sisters) is struggling to untangle these motivations as well, and perhaps it's impossible to separate them. in our own culture–in any culture, really–we can hardly ever claim that the thoughts, decisions and actions we make are ever discrete from the set of ideologies through which we tell the narrative of our lives. i once had a discussion with a friend about the nature of fate versus free will, and he recalled the metaphor of an eastern philosopher who said fate is like an apple rolling on a plate: you can move the apple in any direction, but never beyond the rim of the plate.

maybe consent is also like the apple on a plate. Chinese mothers and daughters are moving within the narrative of Chinese identity, feminine identity, homosocial relations, etc., but they can never make decisions outside of it, just as we can never, say, make decisions outside of a framework of capitalism, since it defines our lives in so many infinite ways. in this sense, consent is always constructed, yet always natural, in that it is the only natural movement we can ever make as human beings living within culture. we want desperately to find a concrete definition of consent that never changes, that fits a legal mold, and yet I suspect that search will always prove elusive. but just as Butler points out that human sexuality refuses to behave in the ways that we want it to, neither does the human mind itself consent to conform to a standard sense of reality, right and wrong. whatever those mean.

today is a good day

this research on arranged marriage is really intriguing...did you know that over 60% of marriages world-wide are arranged? they seem to have high success rates as well–but of course, we don't know that that necessarily means they are "happy." divorce is much more stigmatized, i believe, in countries where arranged marriage is widely practiced. and there is obviously a whole cultural attitude that goes hand in hand with arranged marriage, namely an expectation of how much effort you are going to put in to make the union work (but maybe this is something we can learn from?).

i am waiting on a book from interlibrary loan (come on library system, i have a first draft due soon!) called first comes marriage, by reva seth, in which she interviews hundreds of women in arranged marriages and assesses the values that they encompass. the book should be really interesting, as it's supposed to not only discuss why many arranged marriages are happy, but how westerners can rethink how they approach marriage and partner compatibility in their own "love matches."

i am also waiting for WARM WEATHER to arrive, but today it should be a high of 52 (yayyyy) and tonight i am going to dinner with my cousins to celebrate cousin doug's girlfriend's birthday. i went to marshalls and old navy yesterday and bought new yoga pants and sweatshirts so after doing some more google searching on arranged marriage, i'm heading outside to take advantage of the first visible signs of spring. so today is going to be a good day.

life with marx

you know, we read a lot of marx in my cultural studies program, but the thing is, i still don't really like him. maybe this is unfair, but it seems to me that he was a bit hypocritical, in being so critical of the bourgeoisie while essentially living off the earnings of his business-owning friend, friedrich engels, since he was continually fired from all of his jobs (which, to be fair, was probably because he was so radical).

but i basically think of marx as this guy who's always over at your house because he can't find work or claims he is "hard at work" on the communist manifesto, and you come home from a long day of toil and care, and he's sitting on your couch, unshaven, in a ratty pair of sweatpants, watching TV and loudly complaining about how TV is the opiate of the masses. then he looks up and sees you, and asks you how your day was "conforming to the Man." then he pauses, and asks what's for dinner.

while i know this is a great generalization about marx's life, many people in my program agree that it's probably also a fair assessment about what life with him might have been like.

moving beyond the "firsts"

i have to do a report on a figure in cultural studies for one of my classes, so i chose angela mcrobbie, who, it turns out, is awesome. here she is, looking witty, stylish, and fully tuned-in to the ideologies that define gender in our culture:


feminism today, is, i think, a largely unpopular word for people of my generation. unfortunately, if you say you are a feminist, aka you believe in the equal representation of women's voices, people assume that you hate men and love nascar and burning effigies of paris hilton (actually...would that be fun? let me come back to that one).

but angela mcrobbie is this voice of such good sense and clarity, like princess leia…she does not want feminism to die for this generation of young men and women because it might mean losing a language that allows women's experiences to be acknowledged. but at the same time she recognizes that if the language of feminism doesn't serve women as it originally intended to, then we need to ask ourselves, what will serve?

because the main point is that we tend to think we have "won" wars against race, gender, sexuality, etc. but just because we have made progress (and GREAT progress that we should celebrate) doesn't mean the work is done. as my good friend darryl, a great public speaker, cook, and black member of his community who was invited to speak at this year's martin luther king jr. celebration, said: "why do we celebrate hearing about the 'first black man' to do this, or the 'first woman to do that'? i want to live in a world where we're beyond hearing about 'firsts.'"

if we could also move beyond a world where "diversity" means the token black friend or the token gay friend in an otherwise all-white heterosexual cast to a feature film, that would also be nice.

the danger of living in a culture that stresses equality is that it tends to see it where it doesn't exist, and the willful blindness can become an even more invidiously oppressive system than the formal barriers that earlier movements of the 20th century sought to eradicate.